Tuesday, 9 December 2008

New Poll - How many property portals do we need?

With yet another portal of sorts launched recently I have to ask just how many property portals do we need?

property-matchmaker.com launched a match making property site (the clue is in the name) the other week. I searched for the maximum radius from London of 200 miles and found one agent with a link to their website. So how does this help me and why would I pay £500 odd for the service? I am sure there is a little more to it than that, but people are already doing this, are they not?!

Anyway, I have asked the question before, but not on the poll. So there it is: how many do you think, none, one, more than one, more than ten etc etc. My opinion for what it is worth is that the agent and the public only need one and it should be free! Challenge this and ask, why do we need more?

Starting a portal now may not be such a bad idea it takes time for search engines to start indexing your pages and ranking them so that buyers will find property. This 18 months period for the new site to 'bed in'may mean that its ready for the upturn that will come

Its difficlut times to sell so any new fresh ideas are welcome. How useful it will be will depend on how many people join/sign up. My only worry for the owners is that the property market will be back on track by the time the site is up and running with a google rank etc.

The use of the internet to buy sell and find property has not yet peaked.I predict that estate agents will find it very difficult to justify huge commission payments and that online property sites will become a real alternative to people.The ones that offer the best exposure will dominate

There are a few sites that cater to the home swapping market. Some of them really do work and some of them are free. The problem is convincing the public and estate agents that part exchanging really is a method of creating sales and creating sales which involve much less hassle. Even if the market does pick up, this concept should be one that is used to its full potential as it helps to create sales that may have previously gone un-realised. This is why any part exchange / home swaps site will find it difficult to survive. Even though they do provide a real advantage to any agents that use them. All we need is one site that has a mass of properties from all over the country (easier said than done) and it will work fantastically.